Rell Signs Third Deficit-Cutting Package Since November

Governor M. Jodi Rell signed the deficit-cutting bill today that was passed by the House late Wednesday night and by the Senate early Thursday morning last week. The package will change the state's nearly 30-year-old bottle bill to include water bottles for the first time.

The package was the third one needed to balance the budget in the current fiscal year, starting with a pre-Thanksgiving plan and then subsequent packages in January and February.

The Hartford Courant's Jon Lender is reporting the following:

The bottle deposit provision is expected to net the state an extra $13 million a year in revenue because many people who pay the nickel deposits don't bother to return their bottles. It is part of a deficity-mitgation package that also includes $280.6 million in cuts and revenue increases; $220 million from off-budget funds; $50 million in contract cancellations by the governor; $49.2 million in labor savings that require negotiations with state-employee unions; and $40 million in federal Medicaid funds.

A Rell spokesman told the Courant this afternoon: "While Governor Rell was disappointed the bill did not include a retirement incentive plan, the bill does make strides toward reducing the deficit. It includes no tax increases, and it does not reduce funding for education or for job creation."

"Going forward, Governor Rell believes we must work in a bipartisan manner to resolve not only this year's budget shortfall but the much larger gap that we face in the next two years," the spokesman said. "Difficult choices remain to be made. These choices are already being made by Connecticut families and employers, and the Legislature must follow suit."

The water-bottle deposit provision represents a major turnaround in policy in Connecticut, where environmental advocates have unsuccessfully fought for years against influential legislators and well-paid lobbyists to expand the state's bottle deposit rule.

When the original bottle bill was adopted in 1978, legislators could not have foreseen the explosion in the popularity of bottled water and sports drinks. As a result, those bottles had not been mentioned in the law. Sports drinks and iced-tea are not included in the latest law signed by Rell.